Theoretical modeling and experimental characterization of rate and temperature dependent electromechanical behavior of piezocomposites

The rate-dependent piezoelectric behavior of 1-3 piezocomposite under thermal environment is presented. Thermo-electromechanical effective properties of 1-3 piezocomposites are evaluated based on the Finite Element (FE) resonant model. The experimentally measured vibration modes for Length Extensional (LE) and Thickness Extensional (TE) resonator model are compared with the simulated results for model validation. A 3D finite element model to predict the non-linear rate-dependent behavior of 1-3 piezocomposite under elevated temperature is proposed. In the present work, the internal variables are considered to be the function of loading rate, to simulate the rate-dependent behavior. The predicted thermo-electromechanical effective properties from the resonant model are used as an input to the proposed non-linear model. The simulation is carried out for various combinations of PZT volume fractions, loading rates, temperatures and compressive prestresses under cyclic electrical loading and validated with the experimental measurements.